Nancy Pelosi Seeks To Rewrite First Amendment

 Posted 04/23/2012 07:15 PM ET

IBD EDITORIALS

Free Speech: The former speaker, echoing the president, says the Supreme Court got it wrong in ruling we have the right to pool our money for purposes of political speech.

Leave it to Nancy Pelosi, who said we had to pass ObamaCare in order to find out what's in it, to suggest that a document we had well over two centuries to read was misinterpreted by the court in its Citizens United decision wherein it held that corporations and unions can spend unlimited amounts on political advocacy as long as they do not coordinate with candidates or campaigns.

Pelosi, at a press briefing last Thursday, endorsed a movement announced by other congressional Democrats the day before to ratify an amendment to the Constitution to allow Congress to regulate political speech when it is engaged in by corporations as opposed to individuals.

"Our Founders had an idea. It was called democracy. It said elections are determined by the people, the voice and the vote of the people, not by the bankrolls of the privileged few. This Supreme Court decision flies in the face of our Founders' vision, and we want to reverse it," Pelosi said even as the ObamaCare she shepherded threatens to shred both the First and Tenth Amendments.

We have not heard Ms. Pelosi speak out against President Obama's illegal by unconstitutional recess appointments or his decisions to ignore both Congress and the courts' right to govern any regulation. Pelosi had no problem when a document that begins, "We the people" was trumped by a bill crafted behind closed doors that reads, "the secretary shall determine ..."

Pelosi was among those who stood and applauded when, in a moment worthy of the Roman Coliseum rather than a State of the Union address, the president lectured a captive audience of Supreme Court justices,shamefully scolding them on national television for "having reversed a century of law" in a ruling in which the court was protecting freedom of political speech enshrined over two centuries ago in the First Amendment.

We agree with Justice Samuel Alito's eloquent rebuff of the president: "Not true."

"I've introduced a People's Rights Amendment, which is very simple and straightforward," Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., said at Wednesday's forum, where Senate and House Democrats were joined by representatives of Common Cause and People for the American Way in declaring their dedication to enacting a constitutional amendment restricting speech by corporations
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